Week 3: Detox Your Judgments, Your Liver and Kidneys Will Do the Rest

Good. Bad. Clean. Unhealthy. Healthy. Fattening. Indulgent. Guilt-free. 

Diet culture’s toxic messaging has fed us and made us internalize arbitrary food judgments based on the trend of the hour. 

In today’s day and age, foods that are low in sugar get labeled “healthy” and foods that are low in calories get labeled “guilt-free.” If something doesn’t meet diet culture’s standards, it’s deemed “bad,” “indulgent,” “unhealthy,” “fattening,” or any other guilt-ridden adjective. 

Spoiler alert: Food doesn’t have moral value.

So let’s talk about food judgments!

Food judgments describe the thoughts and opinions we hold about foods. And apart from being arbitrary and baseless, they’re actually more harmful for our health than any one food (more on that in a moment).

I like to separate food judgments into 2 categories:

1- Food Labels

2- Food Rules

Food labels describe any one of the adjectives we use to describe foods -- positive or negative. 

• Cookies are bad

• Kale is healthy

• Popcorn is guilt-free

• Chips are fattening

• Apples are clean

Food rules describe the rules we have around foods (when and how often we can eat them, and how much we can consume when we do). Food rules are usually born out of judgments about a food’s healthfulness, diet culture myths, or how we think certain foods will impact our bodies. 

• I can only eat fruit in the morning

• I’m allowed dessert on the weekends

• I can eat pasta once a week

• I need to have vegetables with dinner

Now…you may be wondering how in the world you go about identifying your food judgments. Well, there are the obvious ones that you use to describe food in conversation. But there are a lot more subtle judgments that we aren’t even aware of. 

1. Indecision! Unless you’re at the Cheesecake Factory or a diner with a 10-page menu. Usually going back and forth over and over between food choices is a sign that there’s some “should-ing” or “labeling” or overthinking about food going on. Should I have the grilled chicken? Or should I have the macaroni? I really want the macaroni. But I had a sandwich for lunch. Is that too many carbs? And I can’t control myself around pasta. I always overeat. Even if your thoughts aren’t so overt, there is likely a subconscious dialogue going on where you are weighing more than just what you’re most in the mood for. 

2. Skipping sections on the menu or aisles at the grocery store. Ever question why you never even engage with the pasta section on the menu, or why your eyes always head to the salad section? Or why you avoid certain aisles at the grocery store? Curiosity, curiosity, curiosity. There’s a lot of information to explore. 

3. Thinking about your meal once you’ve eaten. Your meal is over but you’re still thinking about what you just ate, or food in general. You might be second-guessing your choice to eat something (or not), or mulling over how much you ate. Take a closer look at your choices. There are likely some labels or judgments at play.

4. A low mood post-meal. If you’re feeling down after eating and you aren’t sure why, it could be disappointment, guilt, or shame causing you to feel this way. Our emotions are messengers. Think about what your feelings are trying to tell you. 

Okay, so you have food judgments, and you’ve been able to find them. But like…why does it even matter if you label a brownie “indulgent”? 

By now some of you are probably still thinking it’s not that big of a deal…right? 

Any time you eat a food you’ve labeled “bad” or “unhealthy,” you’re consuming guilt and shame, only to reinforce the label even more.

And if you ask me, food is best served without a side of guilt. 

For most people, when their mind sees a brownie, they see all the toxic messaging diet culture has reinforced. And when they eat said brownie, their mind tells them awful things about who they are as a person -- compulsive, lacking self-control, gluttonous, shameful, and more. 

Spoiler alert: your body has no idea it’s eating a brownie. 

Instead, when you eat a brownie, your body sees nutrients it’s ready to break down, absorb, and use as fuel. 

Hard truth: Our minds know what we’re eating, but our bodies have no clue. 

The same goes for kale. When you see kale, you see the glorified messaging diet culture has reinforced. A superfood, the image of health. And when you eat kale, you feel great -- not necessarily physically, but emotionally. 

But when you eat kale, your body isn’t singing, and there’s no celebratory anthem playing in the background. Sure, it’s probably happy about the vitamins and fiber it gets, but it really couldn’t care less if those are coming from kale or dark chocolate.

Speaking of dark chocolate -- you (aka your mind) would probably feel a lot “better” eating 300 calories of lentils than 300 calories of chocolate. And while your body might miss a little protein and enjoy a little less fiber, your body would be just as happy for you giving it similar amounts of iron, magnesium, manganese, copper, potassium, phosphorus, zinc, and selenium. Just some food for thought...

Food is not the enemy, food judgments are. 

And you are not on trial for your food choices. 

Seriously, eating is not a damn crime. In fact, it’s more of a crime to deprive yourself of finding enjoyment and pleasure in food. 

Questions? Thoughts? Let's keep the conversation going in our private group in the online BALG community! We’ve been loving how much activity there’s been in there -- our community has been sharing their struggles, their wins, sneaky ways in which diet culture is showing up, asking questions, and so much more! 

Don’t forget to join us Wednesday, October 28th at 5:00pm PST/8:00pm EST on Zoom for our group call! (The zoom link is available in the events tab of our online community. Come chat, sit in the background and observe, or ask all the questions!)

Last but not least, we'll share all the journal prompts for this week on the Badass Lady Gang Instagram page.  

Questions? Comments? Concerns? CLICK HERE and submit them! We’ll try to answer them in the weekly episodes of the podcast. 

You’ve got this!

Peace, love, and no labels, 

Kayla